Pension increases in works

May 14, 2001|By Ray Long, Tribune staff reporter.

SPRINGFIELD — Gov. George Ryan and some key lawmakers are pushing proposals that would sweeten pensions for longtime senior staffers and many incumbent legislators, according to lawmakers familiar with the negotiations.

Their biggest roadblock is House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago).

"I just think that we're all well-advised to stay away" from those types of pension provisions, Madigan said.

With two weeks left in the legislative session, pension bills range from bolstering benefits for widows of fallen Chicago firefighters to letting Chicago aldermen retire with benefits at age 55. Senate Republicans have linked them to a desire to make it a state law that prison guards should be fired if tests show they use drugs.

Sen. Robert Molaro, the Chicago lawmaker who is the leading Democrat on pension issues in the Senate, said that view doesn't make sense.

"I mean, that's an expression you used when you were a kid," he said. "That's absolutely where we're headed."

The Ryan administration is the prime force behind a measure that would give senior administrative and legislative staff the chance to enter a leaner version of the lucrative General Assembly retirement system, both Republican and Democratic lawmakers said.

Ryan aides downplayed any pension discussions, saying a variety of ideas is discussed every year.

One proposal--aimed at taking care of longtime political loyalists--could give bureaucrats a chance to retire with annual benefits worth 75 percent of their salaries once they are 55 and have 20 years of service. Some make more than $100,000 a year. To reach the 75 percent level now, staff members must work 44 years, legislators said.

About 75 bureaucrats in the Ryan administration and on legislative staffs would be eligible for the plan, which probably would require the state and the employees to contribute more to the pension system.

Lawmakers can get pensions worth 85 percent of their salaries once they turn 55 and serve for 20 years, but a plan is quietly emerging that would make it easier to reach that level.

Lawmakers would be given a two-year period in which they could pay a cheaper rate to transfer into the General Assembly retirement system any pension credits they accrued while working in a different public job, such as a city position where benefits are lower, legislators said.

Lawmakers currently can include time worked on a different public job in calculating their pension benefits, but have to pay more.

Philip said he probably would support such a plan for legislators. As for the proposal to help senior staff, Philip said he is not pushing the plan but acknowledged Ryan is.

Madigan has backed the bills to buttress benefits for the widows of Chicago firefighters and for disabled police. Another omnibus package to improve pensions for many city employees also includes the controversial provision that would let Chicago aldermen retire with pension benefits at age 55 instead of 60. Costs of those plans are not borne by the state, and the bills are pending in the Senate.

Restructuring and easing pension rules is popular now because lawmakers are uneasy about whether they will be re-elected or voted out of office once new district boundaries are drawn to match population figures in the new U.S. census.

With two weeks left in the legislative session, pension bills range from bolstering benefits for widows of fallen Chicago firefighters to letting Chicago aldermen retire with benefits at age 55.